Seventy-five drinking water brands failed microbial testing administered by the Food and Drug Administration in February. Instead of requiring water manufacturers to lower the bacterial content of their products, the FDA has simply lowered its safety standards.
The FDA measures the microbial content of drinking water using the heterotrophic plate count (HPC) method, which reveals the number of bacterial colonies that grow in a milliliter of water inside a Petri dish. The FDA previously required all water brands in Myanmar to contain less than 100 colonies per milliliter. Following the failure of these brands to meet that standard, the FDA will now grant licenses to brands that contain 500 colonies per milliliter.
Several of the brands that failed had over 300 colonies per milliliter.
FDA director-general Dr. Than Htut told Eleven: “We use the HPC method to study the growth of bacteria. Different countries have different SPC criteria. In the US and the EU, the standard is 100 bacterial colonies per milliliter. Our standard was also 100 per milliliter, but that was apparently too high for domestic brands. We have relaxed the criterion to 500 per milliliter after learning that this level is accepted in other Southeast Asian countries.”
“However, we still won’t approve any brands whose drinking water contains coliform bacteria, including E. coli,” he added.
According to the World Health Organization, the limit of 100 colonies per milliliter “is not directly correlated to the potential health risk. Rather, it reflects the efficiency of the filtration process, meaning it is only indirectly correlated to the lowering of the risk of infection, particularly for gastrointestinal infections acquired by ingestion.”
Myanmar has 997 drinking-water production firms, and FDA officials test their products every two years using a four-stage procedure. In the first stage of an inspection, FDA officials visit the production site and take samples. In the second and third stages, they inform the manufacturer of flaws in the water production process and offer instructions on how to improve. In the fourth stage, FDA officials conduct a final test and approve the brand if the product passes.
In the February inspection, 34 new brands failed at the third step and eight at the fourth; 26 existing firms failed at the third step and seven at the fourth.
The FDA declined to reveal the brands that initially failed the microbial test but said the plants are located in Mayangon, Hlaing, Taikkyi, East Dagon, South Okkalapa and Thingangyun townships.
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